KIHM (920 AM) is a

radio station Radio broadcasting is the broadcasting of audio (sound), sometimes with related metadata, by radio waves to radio receivers belonging to a public audience. In terrestrial radio broadcasting the radio waves are broadcast by a land-based rad ...

broadcasting a

Catholic The Catholic Church (), also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the List of Christian denominations by number of members, largest Christian church, with 1.27 to 1.41 billion baptized Catholics Catholic Church by country, worldwid ...

religious radio Religious broadcasting, sometimes referred to as faith-based broadcasts, is the dissemination of television and/or radio content that intentionally has religious ideas, religious experience, or religious practice as its core focus. In some coun ...

format. Licensed to

Reno, Nevada Reno ( ) is a city in the northwest section of the U.S. state of Nevada, along the Nevada–California border. It is the county seat and most populous city of Washoe County, Nevada, Washoe County. Sitting in the High Eastern Sierra foothills, ...

, United States, it serves the Reno area. The station is owned by

Relevant Radio Relevant Radio (corporate name Relevant Radio, Inc.) is a radio network in the United States, mainly broadcasting talk radio and religious programming involving the Catholic Church. Relevant Radio broadcasts "talk radio for Catholic life" over a ...

History

KOLO

On September 25, 1944, the Reno Broadcasting Company filed an application with the

Federal Communications Commission The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is an independent agency of the United States government that regulates communications by radio, television, wire, internet, wi-fi, satellite, and cable across the United States. The FCC maintains j ...

for a new radio station to broadcast on 920 kHz in Reno with 1,000 watts. ( Guide to reading History Cards) The FCC approved its application, and that of Sierra Broadcasting Company for 1340 kHz, on March 7, 1946. Taking an affiliation with

CBS CBS Broadcasting Inc., commonly shortened to CBS (an abbreviation of its original name, Columbia Broadcasting System), is an American commercial broadcast television and radio network serving as the flagship property of the CBS Entertainme ...

and the call letters KOLO, the station signed on the air August 10, 1946 as the third in town. The same interests involved in starting KOLO, Hi Wells and David McKay, would also build

Las Vegas Las Vegas, colloquially referred to as Vegas, is the most populous city in the U.S. state of Nevada and the county seat of Clark County. The Las Vegas Valley metropolitan area is the largest within the greater Mojave Desert, and second-l ...

station KORK in 1950. In 1955, Wells and McKay sold their Nevada broadcasting holdings to Donald W. Reynolds, who owned the ''

Las Vegas Review-Journal The ''Las Vegas Review-Journal'' is a daily subscription newspaper published in Las Vegas, Nevada, since 1909. It is the largest circulating daily newspaper in Nevada and one of two daily newspapers in the Las Vegas area. The ''Review-Journal' ...

'' and television stations in Las Vegas ( KLRJ-TV, renamed KORK-TV) and Reno (KZTV channel 8, which became

KOLO-TV KOLO-TV (channel 8) is a television station in Reno, Nevada, United States, affiliated with ABC and The CW Plus. It is owned by Gray Media alongside Incline Village–licensed low-power Telemundo affiliate KXNV-LD (channel 26). The two st ...

in 1956). The next year, KOLO radio moved from its original location on Sierra Street to the El Cortez Hotel. In 1963, after a three-year wait, the FCC authorized KOLO to increase its daytime power to 5,000 watts. After KOLO television was forced to rebuild after a 1977 fire, a new building next to it was constructed in 1981 to provide space for KOLO radio and Donrey's outdoor advertising business. At the time, the station aired an

adult contemporary Adult contemporary music (AC) is a form of radio-played popular music, ranging from 1960s vocal and 1970s soft rock music to predominantly ballad-heavy music of the 1980s to the present day, with varying degrees of easy listening, pop, soul ...

format, switching to country music in April 1983.

KQLO

In 1987, Donrey sold KOLO radio after 32 consecutive years of ownership to Constant Communications of Nevada, owners of KWNZ (97.3 FM). The call letters were changed to KQLO later that year, though the station initially retained its country music format. The next year, Constant switched KQLO to news/talk. In 1989, Constant sold its radio stations to a subsidiary of

Pacific Telecom Pacific Telecom, Inc., originally Telephone Utilities, Inc. and now CenturyTel of the Northwest, Inc., was an independent telephone company that owned over 600,000 telephone lines in 12 states prior to its acquisition by CenturyTel. History Nor ...

Vancouver, Washington Vancouver ( ) is a city on the north bank of the Columbia River in the U.S. state of Washington (state), Washington, located in Clark County, Washington, Clark County. Founded in 1825 and incorporated in 1857, Vancouver had a population of 190, ...

. Citing low ratings, Pacific wasted little time making its own format shift, flipping the station to oldies in January 1990. The station used the

Kool Gold Classic Hits (known as Kool Gold until June 17, 2012) is a 24-hour music format produced by Westwood One. Its playlist is composed of oldies music from the mid-1960s to mid-1980s, from artists such as Billy Joel, The Beatles, The Temptations, Flee ...

syndicated format; when this was discontinued by the

Satellite Music Network Satellite Music Network was the first satellite delivered Radio network, network to provide complete live 24-hour-a-day music programming to radio stations, local stations, under several different formats. History Affiliate stations, mostly i ...

on December 31, 1994, KQLO switched to simulcasting KWNZ. The end of Kool Gold heralded the sale of the station. In 1995, KQLO was acquired by Universal Broadcasting for $325,000 and began broadcasting Spanish-language programming as "Radio Universal".

Catholic radio

In 1999, Universal sold KQLO to Thomas Aquinas School of

Tahoe City, California Tahoe City (formerly Tahoe) is an unincorporated area, unincorporated town in Placer County, California, Placer County, California. Tahoe City is located on the shore of Lake Tahoe, at the outlet of the Truckee River. The site was surveyed in 1 ...

. In 1997, after Doug Sherman drove from Reno to Vermont without hearing a single Catholic radio station, the school had bought

1590 AM The following radio broadcasting, radio stations broadcast on AM broadcasting, AM frequency 1590 kHz: 1590 AM is a Regional broadcast frequency. Argentina * LRI434 in Dolores, Buenos Aires. * Serodino in Serodino, Santa Fe. * Stentor in Bue ...

and relaunched it as Catholic radio outlet KIHM, which then switched frequencies with KQLO to put KQLO on 1590 and KIHM on the stronger 920 signal. Universal leased the 1590 frequency from Aquinas with the option to buy. It was the first station in the Immaculate Heart Media network, which by the time of its 2017 merger with Relevant Radio had grown to 23 stations in the western United States.

References

External links

{{Relevant Radio IHM IHM Catholic radio stations Radio stations established in 1946 Relevant Radio stations 1946 establishments in Nevada